


Partners In Crime

by del_writes



Category: X-Men (Movieverse)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, Cherik Secret Santa, Erik is pining, He's got it bad, M/M, The Man from U.N.C.L.E style 60's spy thing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-28
Updated: 2016-12-28
Packaged: 2018-09-12 21:46:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9091990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/del_writes/pseuds/del_writes
Summary: Things always get complicated when feelings are involved. Especially spy work.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Cherik secret santa for tumblr user bollywood-and-phoenix-feather

Agents Xavier and Lehnsherr had been partners in (stopping) crime for a long time now. But despite the longevity of their partnership, Erik was always reluctant to work with someone other than himself. It had nothing to do with Charles. Charles was lovely, and a brilliant agent, but as someone who had always worked alone, Erik thought that letting someone else in on your secrets seemed counter intuitive. Especially since, officially, they were parts of different agencies. But after their first accidental mission together, Agent MacTaggert had insisted that they should form a team of mutants for mutants. To help keep them safe, and keep them secret. 

Of the original team, it was only the two of them left. The number had decreased for many different reasons. Some had gone on to bigger and better things. Some had lost their lives in the line of action. And one, who was perhaps closest to Charles and Erik, well, they struggled to talk about it. That loss was the hardest, not because this person was dead, but because after what happened, Charles had felt personally betrayed. Erik felt he could understand why they did what they did, but out of sympathy for Charles, he refrained from bringing it up. 

After all of these years, putting aside his small doubts about the partnership, his reservations, Erik felt like he trusted his British counterpart more than his colleagues in his own organisation. He'd even go as far as saying that he was endeared by all of Charles's little mannerisms. It was strange how the two of them had gone from distrusting to what they were now. 

During their first mission, Erik had woken up one morning to his bedside clock stuck at 3:07, the second hand ticking and then jumping back to where it had started. Assuming there was something wrong with the cogs in the back, he prised it open, only to come face to face with a listening device. A bug. Obviously made by the CIA. And there was only one person who could have done it. He stormed into Moira's office, and stopped in front of Agent Xavier, letting the collection of bugs he had found in his room fall onto the table, clattering loudly. 

"These," he paused, looking between Charles and Charles's then partner, "are American made." 

Charles raised his eyebrow, a small smirk appearing on his lips. Reaching inside his jacket pocket, he pulled out his own collection of bugs. 

"These are German made," he said calmly. "And very crudely made." 

It was that day where Erik felt his first inkling of respect for Charles. And that respect was the basis of their relationship now. The relationship that allowed them to know exactly what the other would do without any conversations or mind reading. And it was the idea that someone knew him so well that filled him with a vague sense of dread. 

But when Charles entered the room, a worried look on his face, the overwhelming feeling of concern that washed through Erik's body told him that no matter what his spy training told him about getting that close to someone, he had definitely formed an emotional attachment to his colleague. 

"What's wrong?" Erik was up in a second, resting a hand on Charles's shoulder.   
"Moira's calling us in," he replied hesitantly.   
"Because?"   
"She has an update on Raven." 

Of course that's what had him shaken. The only thing that could affect the unflappable Charles Xavier was his adoptive sister who had left him behind. Left him feeling hurt and betrayed. 

His mood didn't improve as they headed to Agent MacTaggert's office and sat in the two chairs opposite her desk. Moira plopped a folder down in front of Charles before starting to talk. 

"As you know, Raven hasn't exactly been making it easy for us to track her since she um," pausing to think of a delicate way to put it, Moira flipped through her mental thesaurus to find a suitable word, "left, but some of our other agents have been following leads, and we think we know what's she's up to."   
"Up to?" Charles scoffed. "You're making it sound like she's some kind of... villain."   
"Charles, calm down. We're not insinuating anything of the sort. What I'm trying to say is, we know what she's trying to do, but we need to stop her."   
"Stop her? I'm sure she's not trying to do anything so bad that requires us to intervene. She's not a bad person."   
"Have you ever heard of Bolivar Trask, Agent Xavier?"   
"He's a scientist."   
"A scientist who's developing an anti-mutant weapon. And we think Raven's going after him."   
"Surely if he's developing something like that, what she's doing is a good thing."   
"If she succeeds in killing him she will prove to the rest of the world that Trask's weapon will be needed as a deterrence against the 'up and rising mutant threat'. Is that something you're willing to let happen because you don't want to harm you're sister? This is something much bigger than all of us, you can't let family ties get in the way." 

Flipping through the folder which Moira had handed them, Erik looked over several photos and headlines; evidence linking Raven to a group of mutant extremists, performing dangerous acts against the humans. She was trying to get a point across, trying to improve lives for mutants, but the way she was going about it was all wrong. Or was it? 

Looking to Charles now, Erik knew what was going to happen. They were going to go after Raven to try and stop her, and Charles would attempt to convince her to come back. Erik knew that whilst they could prevent Trask from dying, getting Raven back on their side would be difficult. Especially with Charles moping around like he was at this current moment in time. 

However within a few days, Charles was mostly back to his usual self, treating this as a normal mission, and Erik finally felt that they were ready to get out into the field to gain intel on Raven's whereabouts, and of course, on Trask. 

Erik quickly became frustrated when he realised that they had to approach tracking Raven differently to usual. Due to her shapeshifiting abilities, Erik couldn't be his normal creature of habit, he had to think outside the box, which had always been more Charles' domain. This fact made him more grateful than ever for his presence. The two of them spent days observing the area of Raven's suspected hideout but all they saw were passers by, and she could have been any one of them. The progress they had made with Trask was also minimal. 

After a long day, once back at their temporary residence, they began to unwind with a game of chess, which Charles won, as he usually did. It was halfway through the game when Charles started drinking some kind of alcohol. Erik wasn't sure what it was, but it smelled strong. He had been offered some by the now slightly tipsy Brit, but had politely refused. Resetting the chess board, he decided that perhaps another game would help to calm his mind further. Not that he expected he'd be able to concentrate. Charles always managed to draw his focus from what he was doing. 

"Playing another game?" There was Charles' voice behind him. A chin rested on his shoulder, and hot breath tickled his ear. It became obvious that Charles was definitely going to be a distraction this evening.   
"Yes," Erik replied, moving the first piece.   
"By yourself?"   
"Yes."   
"It's the only way you'll win." 

A laugh erupted out of Erik's throat as Charles stood back up, walking to the other side of the room. Erik tried to listen to the direction the padding of his feet were going but it was no use. 

There was a moment of silence. 

When music started crackling out of the radio, it suddenly became obvious. It took all of Erik's will power not to turn around, as that would do him no good. Every time he observed Charles doing something goofy and unprofessional, something he never would have expected from the way he acted at work, it was like he fell further down the figurative rabbit hole. Despite how much he told himself that the swell of affection he felt was in a platonic manner, the voice in the back of his head, which he was sure was modelled after Raven, told him that it wasn’t. 

As the music continued, Erik's efforts at staying focused were in vain. He threw down his chess piece, stood up, and walked over to Charles, who continued to dance strangely. Gently placing down his glass, Charles then gently picked up Erik's wrists and waved his hands about in a poor imitation of the dance he was just doing himself. 

This was the total opposite of what Erik had intended to happen. After abandoning his chess game, he just wanted to switch the music off, and go to his room to try and sleep before the long day they would have tomorrow. But now he was stuck. Not that he minded much. 

"Charles," he said quietly. "Come on, we should go to sleep."   
"But I'm not tired," Charles sighed, continuing to sway out of time to the music. 

It would have been impossible for Charles to miss the look of infuriation that passed over Erik's face, but that didn't stop him from trying to spin Erik round, which of course ended in disaster. 

As Erik tumbled backwards, he desperately grasped for something to help keep him upright. When all his hands found was the fabric of Charles' shirt, his landing on the floor was much more painful than it would have been 2 seconds before. He felt an elbow jab into his torso, a knee slam into his upper thigh. Any attempt to stand up was futile. The harder Erik tried, the heavier Charles was on his chest. 

So he stopped trying. 

And in that moment Erik cursed the universe for creating this situation which allowed him to see the way the light shone in Charles' eyes, making them seem even more blue than he had previously thought possible, and the happiness in them all the more prominent. If he wasn't trying to repress the Raven-like voice in the back of his head, he would have taken the opportunity which the world had so graciously provided him with, and kissed Charles. 

But he didn't. 

Instead, he tried to resume what he was trying to do earlier. 

"Get up," Erik said shortly.   
"Why?" The whine in Charles' voice in that moment made him sound more like a five-year-old than a grown man. Perhaps he had had more alcohol than Erik had thought.   
"Bed."   
"Well, if you insist." 

The change in atmosphere was almost immediate. There was no denying that Charles was definitely flirting with Erik, and he had no idea how to react to the situation. 

"I didn't mean it like that," was all he could manage.   
"You never do." Charles' face was now painfully close. "That's the problem." 

Erik was sure that the gap between their faces was getting smaller, and the two sides of him were at war, and the side lead by the Raven-like voice was winning. The urge to doing something he would later regret was increasing, but it turned out that there would be no opportunity to act on that urge, because before he knew it, Charles had fallen asleep, preventing any more attempts to stand up on Erik's behalf. And eventually, although he was incredibly uncomfortable, Erik himself also drifted off into a peaceful night's sleep 

It was roughly 5 o'clock in the morning when he re-awoke, and the weight on his chest was less. Now only half on top of Erik, Charles was still in a deep slumber, snoring lightly. The scene was one of tranquillity, and it was very reluctantly that he gently pushed Charles off. Stretching out, he looked around the front room, and his eyes landed on something, or rather someone that he hadn't expected to see. 

"Raven?"


End file.
